In the field of communications (e.g., telecommunications), individuals can subscribe to services offered by a number of different service providers. A service provider can provide services, such as mobile and/or fixed phone service and/or other communications service functionalities, through a telecommunications system. For example, an individual can subscribe to a particular communications service for their phone that is offered by a particular service provider.
With respect to communication device service providers, an individual often makes this decision based upon the features offered by the service provider and/or the service's compatibility with the individual's device that accesses the communications system.
A communications system can include various functions which can work together to provide services to subscribers. Within these are services that provide a ringtone, message, or other type of information that is provided during some portion of the communication processing that creates a communication link between users of the system.
In some systems, users can be subscribers and non-subscribers. For example, a user that is a non-subscriber may contact the system in order to communicate with a user that is a subscriber. In such instances, some functions of the systems being contacted may be compatible with the functionalities of the system to which the contacting party is a subscriber and some functions may not be compatible.
One service that can be provided by a communications system (e.g., a telecommunications system), sometimes referred to as color ringback tone (CRBT), allows a called party to play a message or ringtone for the calling party to hear while the communication device system is connecting the party's devices for communication. For example, the called party can play a message such as “Thank you for calling, your call is important to us, please stay on the line and our service staff will help you as soon as they are available.”
However, some communication device systems have become so fast at setting up the call connections that the CRBT is cut short (e.g., before the entire message has played). In some systems, even with short ringback tones, the ringback tone can be cut off before it finishes. In some systems, this issue can be an annoyance or can provide an incoherent message to a listener.